Breaking news, midnight - Peace in the Middle East?

It could not have cut off all food, water and fuel on 8th October as everyone would be well dead by now. Wwm2

Whitewavemark2

I see absolutely no benefit is continually going over the past. My opinion about the 8th October has been posted numerous times.

Israel had every right to self defence - no question about it. I fully supported and continue to support that right as a sovereign country.

Israel as a fully signed up state, also had a duty to keep within the rules of law regarding warfare.

It failed to do so from 8th October, when it cut off all food, water and fuel.

I am not denying Israel has gone too far and made many errors over the last two years.

Hamas could have ended this by returning the hostages immediately.

They didn’t do so, they used them as bargaining chips whilst hiding safely underground like the cowards they are.

I am not defending all of Israel’s actions but I am calling out that this situation is 100% Hamas made

As an old liberal (with a small L) I am totally signed up to the post war settlement, that has guided the west in particular regarded the relationship between states and the guidance for states and its relationship with its citizens.

That is why I will always criticise any state, including any of our allies who break these laws with impunity, because without them it will become the law of the jungle and the citizens have no protection from a state and small countries have no protection from an almighty and powerful state.

History shows that Israel have oppressed the Palestinians people for many years. Where there is oppression there will be a reaction eventually and the attack in October 2023 was a result of this.
The attack was brutal and dreadful and most people agreed on that but looking at the way the Palestinians have been treated in Gaza it was bound to happen at some time.
Hamas was allowed to thrive by Netanyahu and had built up enough resources to engage in the atrocity.

It's really not as clear cut and simple as some believe

Exactly ronib
I have seen countless references to Gaza having no food, water, electricity supply since the war began.
References from various sources.

Of course Hamas initiated this latest fracas and has been utterly condemned for it - I absolutely go along with that.

Honestly it shouldn’t need saying really.

However, as the King Of Jordan indicated, there will never be peace for Israel or the Arabs until a two state solution is reached. And until a two state solution is reached where people is Israel and Palestine are both prosperous and secure in their sovereignty there will always be an ideology that fights suppression manifesting itself in the form of “freedom fighters” like Hamas.

We should have learned this from Vietnam and Afghanistan - you can never kill an ideology with violence. If fact it will thrive under oppression, only politics, economic success and cultural integration suppresses violent ideology.

Maybe Israel would eventually agree to a two state solution if, and big if, an outside authority could protect Israel from threat of attack by Palestinians? So a peace keeping body paid for by both states until it became clear that Gaza and the West Bank were responsible and reliable partners. Israel would need the strongest guarantees in concrete terms to agree to two states.

Bloody Sunday 1972 Derry comes to mind

Cyprus?

ronib

Maybe Israel would eventually agree to a two state solution if, and big if, an outside authority could protect Israel from threat of attack by Palestinians? So a peace keeping body paid for by both states until it became clear that Gaza and the West Bank were responsible and reliable partners. Israel would need the strongest guarantees in concrete terms to agree to two states.

There's a very obvious fault with that idea. The Palestinians are going to think "Why would we pay from our money towards protecting what's left of Palestine from those that seized the rest of it?" Netanyahu's lot are basically the aggressors and individual settlers. Followed by the second question of "....and where would the money come from anyway? Netanyahu's lot seem to have plenty of money - but we don't".

Anniebach

Quote theworriedwell Thu 16-Oct-25 11:01:18
Anniebach
Hamas caused devastation 7th October 2023
Yes they did but they didn't bomb Gaza and kill and bury under rubble Gazans and Israelis.

Israel didn’t sexually abuse children in their cribs, didn’t rape , didn’t lock people in rooms and set fire to them ,
didn’t take small children from Gaza to Israel

And that has absolutely nothing to do with how difficult it will be to find the bodies under the rubble.

We all know about October 2023, no one denies that, I haven't seen anyone try to minimise it but you cannot accept that the IDF has also done wrong.

Of course Israel has totally turned its face against a two state solution, and by doing so it has condemned itself to perpetual war. The past 70 years will be continually repeated. Israel will lose more of its best young people and its cultural mindset will be one of victimhood and war and not one of cooperation and peace.

Not true CariadAgain. Bottom line is do the Palestinians wish to come to terms with 1948 or not? Moving forward is preferable to being stuck in 1948. It’s going to be beautiful in Gaza ….

I hope Trump of all people can turn this situation around especially with regard to the two states solution and a peace keeping force…. A wanton and inhumane waste of life is the alternative.

ronib

Not true CariadAgain. Bottom line is do the Palestinians wish to come to terms with 1948 or not? Moving forward is preferable to being stuck in 1948. It’s going to be beautiful in Gaza ….

I wonder if you'd move on easily if your home was taken from you, most of your country was taken from you? Israel is not poor, I've never understood why they couldn't offer compensation, make Gaza and the West Bank prosperous and safe. It would have been a great investment, crushing people is just causing problems that are ongoing unless of course you intend to completely eliminate them.

Whitewavemark2

As an old liberal (with a small L) I am totally signed up to the post war settlement, that has guided the west in particular regarded the relationship between states and the guidance for states and its relationship with its citizens.

That is why I will always criticise any state, including any of our allies who break these laws with impunity, because without them it will become the law of the jungle and the citizens have no protection from a state and small countries have no protection from an almighty and powerful state.

Is a state always bound to keep within the laws and rules of warfare when its enemy does not, and conceals weapons, soldiers and command posts in residential areas, hospitals, schools and mosques? When the enemy confiscates food supplies for its troops rather than civilians? Does the state risk losing and failing to protect its citizens to retain the moral high ground and stay within the “rules”? I’m not condoning this but it presents any such state with a terrible dilemma. How do you protect your citizens from an enemy with no regard to any rules of warfare and who wishes to utterly destroy you?

Before there is any chance of a 2 state solution being accepted by Israel, the Palestinians have got to prove that they can live alongside Israel, their claim to the whole of the state had got to be dropped.
Do the Palestinians want to be on a perpetual state of war when the casualties resulting are 10 and 20 times that of Israel.

With regard to the civilian population of course it must keep to the rules of law.

So proportionality and key aspects must be adhered to.

However, with regard to its attacker it has every right to defend itself.

However, just as the Vietcong embedded themselves amongst the population in tunnels etc. the USA learned a very hard lesson that bombing the villages and uses such foul stuff as agent Orange to drive out their enemy was entirely counterproductive and they were entirely defeated.

ronib

Not true CariadAgain. Bottom line is do the Palestinians wish to come to terms with 1948 or not? Moving forward is preferable to being stuck in 1948. It’s going to be beautiful in Gaza ….

"Come to terms" seems a very odd way of describing it. Down at a personal level - just describing my own land (ie my garden) people are told "That's still in my legal ownership - but that bit there is mine too and got stolen off me by the next door neighbours" and I still treat it as mine - because it is still mine in every sense that matters and I've found a way to "pay them back"......

You can't just re-name a bit of someone's land and say "Forget it - it's not yours any more - and btw we are going to rebuild it the way we decide we will". Palestinians will still be saying "That's where my house stands - well it used to. So I own from that point to that point. The invaders rebuilt my land the way they decided to - but what it's really like is....and what I really own is...." People have still got the keys to houses that got stolen off them - there's enough photos around of them holding their keys to prove their ownership of a place that has now been destroyed or is being squatted in and they will send those keys down the generations to prove what their sons and daughters own (as in really own).

People do not just sit and accept being stolen from/injured/killed....

I've watched garden thief next door neighbour hope I'd let her just pretend everything was "nicey nicey" now.....and not letting her do so. People don't forget what they own and how it is...is supposed to be....

Even if it's rebuilt in a fashion Western eyes would see as "beautiful" it will be ugly in the eyes of the people that really own that land and ugly and sad when they recall "That's where my relative died...that's where my friend died".

There are some very strange things being posted here.

"Israel has gone too far" has to be one of the strangest.

Yes I suppose genocide is a bit too far.

All round - people do not forget what is rightfully theirs.

I'm very human and humane - but if someone told me that I could will garden thieving neighbour of mine to some pain/death/loss of money and that I had the say-so about it? She'd be regretting stealing from me - because I'd agree she should have that "punishment". I'm more invested in fairness....than in "turn the other cheek...be magnanimous and why don't you steal some more from me...".

It's called "being human" and "wanting justice".

The villagers and farmers of Capel Celyn were told by England to dig up their ancestors

AGAA4
they know how many they have killed with their bombs
If Hamas hadn’t murdered 1,195 men, women, and children on the night of 7/10/2023 they wouldn’t have to know.

Anniebach

The villagers and farmers of Capel Celyn were told by England to dig up their ancestors

When you live in England - you've never heard of that.

When you live in Wales - you still see new signs going up at intervals telling you to remember it. I've seen new ones being done since I moved here....not aimed at me luckily....as I'm nothing to do with all that and I've learnt by now what things Welsh people will understand and what different things English people will understand. Just this morning I was talking to a further away neighbour and wanted to ask her about something and didn't know which she was - so asked first and got told she's Welsh and at that point told her something I wouldn't have told an English person - as I knew the reaction would be a positive one that I'd done something that she would understand would benefit her house. Yep....she duly smiled. An English person would have given me a very odd look and changed the subject.

You speak of Palestinians burial grounds , I spoke of burial grounds in Wales